Cacao, coconut and crustaceans: five young Filipino farm startups take their pitch to Singapore

Five young Filipino agribusinesses carried their products to the Asia-Pacific Agrifood Innovation Summit in Singapore (27-29 October) to meet investors and partners — with backing from the Department of Agriculture's Young Farmers Challenge. Each turns a local resource into something worth more: L'Reinvente makes skincare from agricultural by-products and creates livelihoods for farmers; CHER Cacao builds bean-to-bar chocolate in Negros Oriental; Bluecrust develops foods from crustaceans; Aelius makes wellness products from every part of the coconut; and Y'Nut turns local peanuts into nutritious, market-ready food. At the summit's Innovation Stage they pitched their models in a dedicated showcase. The lesson they carried home is the one Philippine agriculture is learning nationally: growing is only half the value — processing and branding are the other half.

SDG 8 · Decent work and economic growth — Mechanism: institutional program